Differences and Similarities
by Mine6Chan
Summary: N7 soldier, Alexandra "Alex" Shepard is assigned to the turian led Normandy SR2 as part of a good-will-project to show the improved relationship between humans and turians. Placed on Commander Vakarian's squad she just might start a new life.
1. Introductions

This is my first shot at Mass Effect fanfiction. Hopefully, I didn't do too much of a bad job, not counting the spelling and grammar mistakes. Feedback would be much appreciated. And I'm sorry to say this but I'm a slow updater. Sorry. Really I am. Sorry, I mean. and a slow updater too. Sorry...

Alright, lets try this then and see how it goes.

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**1. Introductions**

Shepard gave a deep sigh as she fiddled with her pack. She had been transferred to the turian-lead ship from the Normandy SR as a result of a good-will-project that the politicians had started in hopes of proving to the public that the relationship between them wasn't as bad as it seemed.

Her commanding officers hadn't been saddened by the news of her transfer. In fact, they were overjoyed to be rid of her. As an N7 soldier she didn't have a very good reputation to begin with, and she'd spent most of her two years on the Normandy SR alone and isolated. She was a good soldier, the best, in spite of her short height, but that had only further alienated her from her fellow soldiers, and her superiors had seen her as a problem rather than an asset.

She'd been used on the Normandy; as a tool and whatever else had been needed. Shepard didn't really mind, though. This life was paradise compared to her life on Earth, and to Shepard; being used meant being wanted, needed. She liked that.

Shepard was nervous about serving on a turian ship. The Normandy SR2, which the crew of the Normandy SR called "Big Sister", was supposedly bigger and better than her predecessor and the turians were supposed to be even stricter when it came to maintenance of their ships. She was hoping that her new commanding officer, a Spectre named Nihlus, would put her to good use on missions though, even if it was just to get rid of her. Shepard didn't care; she needed to be doing something.

She jerked in her seat as the shuttle made a sudden turn, the asari driver throwing a glance her way, and she took a couple of deep breaths as they stopped, trying in vein to calm the butterflies in her stomach. The door on her side opened and Shepard climbed out before she reached back inside to get her stuff.

"Good luck, you're going to need it." her driver said with a smirk on her face. When the asari had first set eyes on the human she had made a sound of disbelief at the short female human standing in front of her. Hardly believing she was an Alliance soldier and assigned to a turian ship.

Shepard watched the shuttle leave before she turned around and looked at her new home. She took a moment to take in the size of the SR2, it was almost twice the size of the SR, before she approached the turians standing on the bridge to the ship, approaching the one who stood out the most. A turian with blue armour, an eyepiece, blue markings across his cheeks and blue eyes. Shepard was surprised at the eye colour. Hers were a plain brown. Blue was an unusual eye colour, about the only thing humans and turians had in common.

It must have been a sight to see; a lone, _short_, human dressed in the standard official Alliance uniform consisting of dress pants and a high collared jacket, the most fancy thing she owned, with an Alliance bag tossed over her shoulder containing her armour, gun and other clothes, approaching a small squad of turians. All of them dressed in their armours with weapons holstered and watching the human with their unblinking predatory eyes. She stopped in front of the turian, him towering over her, and met his gaze head on, unflinching even though she felt like she might throw up. She was just about to announce her name when the turian on the right side of 'Blue eyes' stepped forward and Shepard turned her gaze to take him in. He was as big as 'Blue eyes', but his eyes were a clear green colour, his clans marking white instead of blue and looking like an exaggerated facial tattoo. His armour was also black with red highlights, and standing next to 'Blue eyes' they were an extraordinary sight to behold.

"Alexandra Shepard?" 'Green eyes' asked.

Shepard dropped her bag on the floor and saluted her commanding officers, standing straight and as tall as possible, just barely reaching up to 'Blue eyes' chest.

"At ease, soldier. I'm Nihlus..."

_So he's the Spectre._

"...and this is my ship; the Normandy SR2. I'd give you the basic introduction but I believe you already know more than most given your two years on the Normandy SR."

She placed her hands behind her back to keep them from twitching nervously. "Yes, sir."

Nihlus's mandibles flared in an expression unreadable to Shepard, and then turned slightly towards 'Blue eyes'. "This is my second in command; Commander Garrus Vakarian. He will be your commanding officer and you'll be placed on his squad. I'd introduce you to the rest of the crew but we're running late, we were expecting you earlier."

Shepard took a quick glance past the Spectre and the Commander, and even though she couldn't read the expressions on the turians' faces she could clearly see that she was not welcomed. _Fuck, nice first impression Shepard. _

"I was ordered to report to the Normandy SR2 at 1400 hours, sir." A quick look at the time told everyone there that it was 14:03.

Shepard gave herself a mental pat on the back for not turning into a blabbering fool.

Nihlus crossed his arms and if he'd had eyebrows Shepard was _sure_ that one would have been raised by now. Commander Vakarian shook his head and the two shared a look.

_Shit! I just fucked up, didn't I?_

"Well then, Shepard, it appears that someone made a mistake somewhere. Nevertheless, I would suggest you board the Normandy now. Garrus will show you to your bunk."

Shepard saluted her commanders and then picked up her bag, shifting her attention to the Commander now, and once again meeting his eyes dead on as the Spectre turned and got on the ship.

_Don't let them sense you're about to piss your pants. Turians can **smell** fear. Come on, Shepard. Grow a pair!_

The rest of the turians followed the Spectre, and Shepard kept a respectable distance to her Commander as she followed him aboard the Normandy. Shepard had to restrain herself from moving her head back and forth taking in the interior of "Big Sister". _It's so big!_

They entered the elevator, and as the doors closed and it started to move Shepard almost sighed in annoyance as she discovered that it was as slow on the SR2 as it was on the SR. _Millions of credits spent on the best technology in Citadel space, and they can't solve this problem?_

"The Normandy SR2 has six decks. Top deck is Nihlus's private quarters, the second deck which we were just on is the Combat Information Centre or CIC which also contains an emergency infirmary and an armoury, third deck is crew deck and infirmary, fourth deck is the second armoury, labs and gym, fifth deck is cargo and engineering, and sixth deck is the garage." Commander Vakarian explained and Shepard memorized the new information. It wouldn't do to accidentally end up in Nihlus's private quarters or having to ask for directions. She noticed the commander glancing down at her and she gave a nod to show that she'd heard. The elevator stopped and the odd pair made their way to the females sleeping quarters. As they entered, a female turian, smaller and slimmer, and a bit less rough than the males but still a hell lot bigger than her, saluted and announced the presence of their commanding officer. The Commander led her down the rows of bunk beds and stopped in front of an empty one. Shepard noticed that it was located at the far back, surrounded by other _unoccupied _beds, and there was a low buzzing sound.

_What is that?_

Shepard looked around and placed her bag on the floor, it didn't look that different from the SR, just bigger. _A hell lot bigger_. Commander Vakarian moved besides her and she turned her attention back to him.

"Get comfortable and report to the CIC." the turian told her.

"Yes, sir." Shepard answered and once again stood straight with her hands behind her back.

"Any questions?"

"Not at the moment, sir."

Garrus nodded at her and then left. Shepard stood standing straight until she saw him disappear behind closed doors.

There were several turians on the crew deck, all of them which had stared at her without shame as she walked behind their commander to the sleeping quarters. Shepard had taken a moment to take in the turian in an apron over his armour, standing over a pot in a rather big kitchen, and the couple of turians seated at a table. It looked like they were waiting for dinner in what was obviously the mess hall. The kitchen on the SR wasn't even half the size of this one and there was no assigned cook, people had to worry about their own meals by themselves, and those not gifted with culinary skills relied on dried food provided by the Alliance and the restaurants on the various different stations they ported at, if and when they received permission for shore leave. The SR being a small ship didn't require a big crew so it worked out just fine.

Shepard turned back to her bag and pulled out her armour. It was black with the N7 logo on the breastplate, she also had a visor and a helmet, the later which she only used when the conditions on planets required it as she felt slightly claustrophobic with it on. She'd gotten several dirty looks over the logo on her armour over the years, and her commanding officer had even recommended to her that she have it removed. Shepard had politely declined, her armour the only thing she took pride in besides her gun, and had been ordered to cleaning duty for two weeks.

On the Normandy SR the crew didn't walk around the ship in their armour unless the situation required it. However, a soldier was supposed to be able to get their suit on in under two minutes and there were regular drills to make sure that they could. Shepard didn't think she would be told off for putting on her armour here but she didn't want to come off as hostile, even though there were several turians walking around dressed ready for action, including the cook, but there were also turians, males she supposed, walking around in nothing but pants on the crew deck. So she put away her armour and pulled out the standard uniform for the Normandy SR.

After she'd gotten redressed, and hopefully not done anything to offend her new crew mates, she made her way towards the slow, ever so slow, elevator. Arriving at CIC she quickly spotted Nihlus and Garrus and approached them. She stopped two meters away, standing straight with hands behind her back, waiting for her commanders' attention. Nihlus gave the order to head to the Terminus system and then turned towards Shepard, taking in her new appearance. The suit was snug, showing of her built, but comfortable and practical with its many pockets.

"Shepard. I take it you've settled in?"

"Yes, sir. Commander Vakarian assigned me a bunk, sir."

"And it's to your liking?" Shepard looked confused for a moment and had Nihlus not spent as much time studying humans as he had, he would have missed it.

"Yes, sir. It is to my liking." it wasn't a question, not really, but the look in her eyes showed uncertainty. Was she being tested?

"Good, now come with me. I'll introduce you to the crew." Nihlus didn't hesitate.

Nihlus showed her around the CIC, he introduced her to navigator Calar, an older turian but apparently a living map, and to helmsman Tallur, a small female turian who appeared to be young, though Shepard couldn't tell, she was taking a guess based on the turians juvenile energy. She was surprised to know that Nihlus had an assistant, Yeohman Verk, which was short for Verkaskusler. The Captain on SR hadn't had an assistant, none of her commanding officers had ever had one to the extend of her knowledge.

Nihlus was nothing if not thorough as he introduced Shepard to every member of the skeletoncrew of the Normandy SR2. She was surprised to learn that in the lab there was a salarian, a Dr. Mordin Solus; she was going to have to look him up later. There was also a quarian in engineering, Tali'Zorah was Nema, who was apparently there as a favour to Commander Vakarian and with full access to the ship's systems. _Does the Alliance know about this?_

In the armoury on the CIC there was another big turian like the Commander and the Spectre; Haron, a young sergeant who had been recruited by Nihlus from C-Sec. He didn't appear to be as openly hostile towards her as the other turians had been and Shepard wondered if maybe she could spend her time in the there. She was curious about some of the weapons, not all of them appeared to be according to regulation.

_Nihlus is a Spectre; of course he can have whatever weapons he wants. _Shepard had never worked with a Spectre before, never even meet one, and a _turian_ Spectre at that.

The armoury was the last stop of the tour and Nihlus indicated for the sergeant to leave. When the doors sealed behind him the Spectre turned his undivided attention to Shepard. He leaned back against one of the tables, relaxed. Shepard knew not to let her guard down and got ready to bolt if necesarry. There was no chance of her even being the _slight__est_ challenge to a turian Spectre on his own ship out in space. If he wanted her dead, she was dead. _And being a Spectre he'll get away with it._

"What am I going to do with you?"

The question _didn't_ catch her off guard. The Captain of the Normandy SR had asked her the same. "I have been assigned to the Normandy SR2 and am here to follow your orders, sir."

"The Council order you here. I can't really go against the Council. But I have no use of you; and I don't have the time to evaluate your skills nor to teach you anything."

Shepard shifted her weight from one foot to the other, hands behind her back, back straight. "My profile holds information on my qualifi..."

"I know about your qualifications. But those qualifications are for the _Alliance_, Shepard. _This_ is a _turian_ ship. What makes _you_ qualified for a turian ship?"

Shepard didn't say anything and just looked at him. Tried to read him. Nothing_. _

"I will follow your orders, sir." she repeated.

Nihlus' mandibles flared, Shepard had no idea if that was a good thing or bad. _What does he want me to say? Shit! Shitshitshit! I'm dead._

Nonetheless, despite her fight or flight instincts telling her to high tail it out of there, Alexandra Shepard didn't move a muscle. _No sudden movements and you might just survive this._

They stood there for what felt like hours and then suddenly, Nihlus moved. Towards her. He stepped up close to her, into her personal space, forcing her to look up, _and up_, towering over her like something out of a nightmare.

And she _didn't_ move.

His mandibles flared and then he backed off. "Glad to have you with us, Shepard."

"Sir?" to say that Shepard was confused would be an understatement. Her eyes grew comically big as she knew that something big had just transpired, and she had no idea what it was.

Nihlus didn't acknowledge her and instead called out for Vakarian to enter. He meet him halfway through the armoury.

"She's all yours, Garrus." Nihlus said with a friendlier tone.

_What the hell just happened?_

"Why am I always the babysitter?" Vakarian asked and sighed dramatically.

Nihlus laughed, and Shepard noticed the soft underlying growl in the turian's voice rising. "You're good at it. Don't worry about Garrus, Shepard. He doesn't bite."

"Nice, make me sound like a weakling. _Thank you_, Nihlus."

Alexandra Shepard had no idea what was going on. She was alone, lost and confused on a ship full of turians, most of which seemed to not like having her on board, but somehow a tiny bit of hope ignited inside of her.


	2. Common Ground

Wow, I got a second chapter done pretty fast. But I already had the continuation to the first chapter in my head when I finished it, and right now this is as far as I've come. It's probably going to be a while until I start on a third chapter.

I got a PM from a reader who said they couldn't read the story and asked if I had deleted the story. Obviously I haven't since I've written a second chapter, but I hope no one esle has that problem. It's a shame really. This is a problem I've discovered that has. For about the first 24 hours of a new story being uploaded or a new chapter added, the site sometimes has problems finding it.

I hope the reader who sent the PM has been able to get to this chapter. They said my summary caught their attention and I'm really glad they told me that because I'm always unsure about my summaries. Thanks! And thanks to the people who reviewed. I'm always very happy to hear people like my stories since I usually end up hating them, apparently I'm very hard on myself.

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**2. Common Ground**

Her first day on the Normandy SR2 'Alex' Shepard had been confused, felt lost and found some hope.

Now she was desperately trying to find that microscopic feeling of hope once again as she waited for her meal. The past two weeks she had felt like a roller-coaster of emotions, none of them positive. Her commanding officers had apart from that first day, not even glanced her way and left her to the mercy of the rest of the crew. She hadn't been sent out on any missions, despite her being on Commander Vakarian's squad, she hadn't even left the ship once and Commander Vakarian had left every time they docked somewhere. She'd also been bossed around by the others, sometimes even right in front of the eyes of the Commander and the Spectre, who did _nothing_.

A tray filled with a grey paste slammed down in front of her, rattling the fork like object and sending the bottle of water rolling across the table. Shepard jumped at the sound and quickly caught the bottle. It had been heading towards a pair of turians, technicians, and Shepard just knew they were going to blame her for something if it reached them. She sat back down and grabbed her_ fork? Spork, maybe? I have no name for this thing._

"Enjoy." the cook, his name was Lenks, growled and dared her to make a comment about the food. Like she had supposedly done the first time she had eaten aboard; even though she'd just asked what it was.

"Thank you." Shepard knew better then to complain or to make any other comment that wasn't a compliment and dug in to her bowl of glue like grey paste. By the third meal she had figured out how to eat it without choking. She could only eat three mouthfuls before she had to have a drink of water and then wait for the food to travel down to her stomach before she had three more mouthfuls. The paste tasted like wet cardboard, it didn't help that it had been heated up, and since she had started to eat it she hadn't been able to taste anything else. She was starting to miss the bad taste of 'morning breath'. It was nutritious though; containing exactly what she needed for the day, and filling; she was only eating once a day.

Shepard sneaked a peak at the food the two technicians were eating. While it didn't look like anything she'd ever seen it looked a hell lot better than her food. _It's... colourful. Red, blue and pink. Judging from the way he's inhaling the food it tastes pretty good too.  
_

While not eating or sleeping, Shepard would spend her time down in engineering. Helping Miss Nema upgrade and maintain the ship by crawling into all the little spaces the turians couldn't fit into. The quarian could do it herself but being a personal friend of Commander Vakarian she was higher ranked than Shepard and so the little human had to do the dirty work. Shepard had told them that her tech skills weren't good but they had argued that she just had to follow Miss Nema's instructions. Shepard hadn't dared ask why they didn't send the maintenance mechs; that's was what they were made for.

But Shepard wasn't going to complain; while she worked no one would bother her with mean comments or push her as they passed her. Unfortunately she couldn't go hide in engineering today since Miss Nema had left with Commander Vakarian and Nihlus to investigate a distress call on the planet they were orbiting around. Not that Miss Nema was thrilled to have her down in engineering. Quarians had a bad reputation in Citadel space and humans were known to pass judgements based upon rumours pretty quickly. Shepard was ashamed to admit that she had been wary of the quarian who'd proven to her that the rumours about the quarians were mostly just that; rumours.

She still had five more hours to kill before it was time to for the night-shift to take over and Shepard wondered if she could go hang out in Professor Solus' lab. Not surprisingly, no one else wanted her help and Shepard being left without anything to do would start to feel anxious.

The salarian scientist, who Shepard was almost sure had been part of the Special Tasks Force, was old but a freaking _genius_. He had expressed an interest in Shepard since he hadn't had much contact with humans and was taking the opportunity to study her. But he didn't like to be disturbed when he was working, which was all the time except for when he was sleeping. _But I wouldn't be surprised if he were dreaming about experiments and all that scientific stuff... Maybe I should try Sergeant Haron first. _

Shepard's observation about the former C-Sec officer had been correct. Sergeant Haron, another young turian, had been the only _nice_ turian on the entire ship now that she was being ignored by her commanding officers. Shepard had spent some time in the armoury with him and found out that they shared a passion for short-ranged weapons. Shepard figured that his tolerance and acceptance of her came from his time at C-Sec, which consisted of mostly turians and salarian but now also of a growing number of humans.

Shepard finished her meal as fast as she could, which wasn't very fast and she'd been left alone in the mess hall, and left for the CIC deck. Haron spent most of his time in that armoury rather than in the secondary one. The doors opened to reveal Sergeant Haron cleaning several sniper rifles. He lifted his head and nodded at her. "Shepard, take a seat and grab a rag."

Shepard smiled, took a seat across from Haron and got to work. Haron stared at her.

"For a moment I thought that maybe you wouldn't be able to pick it up."

Shepard looked up with the rifle in her hands. "Sergeant?"

Haron pointed at the weapon. "You're so small and it's heavy."

Shepard looked down at the weapon in her hands. "It's a bit heavier than I'm used to, but turians are stronger than humans so I can see why the heavier ones would be your standard choice." Shepard had always heard comments about her height, being one centimetre taller than the required height she knew she was always going to be called short.

Haron's mandibles flared, and Shepard still wasn't sure if that was a good thing or bad. The only ones who had done that at her had been the Spectre, who now didn't even seem to remember her, and Haron and the Commander, just once though. She'd seen other turians do it as well but never when it involved her. _To hell with it, just ask. If he gets angry you have a turian standard rifle in your hands to defend yourself with. _

"What does that mean?"

Haron looked back at her. "What?"

"That, that thing you do with your mandibles. When they get really wide. What does that mean?"

Haron flared them again just to make sure he knew what she was talking about. "This? You don't know?"

She shook her head, her short hair following her movements. Haron didn't look like he was angry so she continued. "Nihlus did that before, Commander Vakarian's done it once to me, I've seen others to it as well."

Haron was amused. He'd heard a lot of the others complain about the human they had on their ship and how they couldn't read her, and here she was telling him she had the same problem. Haron, having worked with humans for a couple of years before he was recruited by the Spectre, didn't have much trouble reading their expressions and could clearly see that she was genuinely curious and perhaps a little concerned. _Does she think she's offended me?_

"It was a smile."

Now she looked surprised, and confused. "So when you do that..." and Haron flared his mandibles "...it means your smiling?"

"Well, it can be a smile, it depends on the combination of how wide you flare them and the sound you make."

"Sound? Wait, does this mean that Nihlus and the Commander smiled at me?" now she just looked confused and Haron suddenly remembered that humans couldn't hear the low growls that turians made to express different emotions.

"Nihlus is a Spectre, he can do pretty much whatever he wants, and he's actually pretty fond of humans. Sees your potential, but don't tell anyone that. The Commander and Nihlus are pretty close, like brothers; from what I've heard they've known each other for years, since before they did their obligatory service."

"That would explain their … thing two weeks ago." Shepard said and gestured across the armoury. The rifle was slipping off her lap and she pulled it back up.

Without a word Haron picked it up from her lap and instead handed her an assault rifle. Shepard glared, Haron could tell, and he flared his mandibles again. "The assault rifles were next anyway."

Shepard looked down at the new weapon in her hands and then looked back up uncertainly at Haron. "That was a smile right? They got really wide." she said and gestured at her own face where she would have had mandibles had she been turian.

"Yeah, it was a smile. When we flare them it's usually a positive emotion we're expressing; amusement, happiness. But surprise, confusion and other such emotions are also expressed like that. That's were the sound comes in, it's more of a growl, the pitch makes the difference just like it matters how wide we flare them." he said and pointed at his face. "Humans can't hear the growl... but I'm sure you can feel it. Here, place you're hand here." Haron said and pointed to his chest next, he was only wearing the lower part of his armour and had on the black body suit.

Shepard hesitated, but placed the assault rifle on the table and moved to Haron's side of the table and did as he said.

"First I'm going to smile, a plain smile that shows I'm amused and happy. Then surprise and confusion."

Shepard looked closely at his mandibles as he made each expression and her eyes widened in surprise when she could feel vibrations under her hand with each expression. Shepard pulled back her hand and went back to her seat.

"We purr when we're really happy or feeling really good, and negative emotions are expressed by our mandibles pulled tight against our face and with a deeper and darker growling."

"The Alliance didn't cover that when we studied alien anatomy and culture." Shepard told him and flexed her fingers.

"What did it cover then?" this was the first time Haron heard they studied alien anatomy and culture. The turian military didn't teach anything except how to best kill your enemies, and human being the soft creatures they were had been given the lesson 'just point and shot'.

They went back to cleaning weapons and Shepard told him they'd learned the weak points in turian bodies for example, so they would know how to kill them if it ever came down to a hand to hand combat. They'd learnt the same about several other species, and things like how to cause pain without causing permanent damage. It also worked the other way and Shepard knew how to give first aid to several alien races. Shepard gave Haron some tips about where to aim on a krogan, which he already knew, but she also told him were to hit a krogan to cause the most damage in case he ever faced a krogan without a weapon. Haron was impressed but told her he'd never heard of anyone, turian or human, defeating a krogan in hand to hand.

"No one's ever survived but I know about two guys who took down a krogan with them. It was a freaking bloodbath. Nightmare stuff."

"And the culture?" Haron changed the topic, he'd noticed the dark look in her eyes as she'd mentioned the incident.

"So we don't offend potential allies or enemies."

"Why would you worry about offending enemies?"

"If you're a prisoner you don't want to piss off the guy holding you hostage. It'll hurt less that way."

Haron chuckled, which for a turian was a growl loud enough for humans to hear, and they went back to him teaching her how to read turians, with him occasionally asking her about different human idioms.

As they talked and cleaned weapons Shepard felt warm inside for the first time in years. She realized that she enjoyed talking with the other turian and hoped that maybe, just maybe, she was getting to know someone who she could hopefully someday call a friend.

_I hope he thinks the same. _


End file.
